On Indie Haven, Laura Kate and Jordan Webber hold forth in a valuable new letter series on the sexual and personal space politics of Hugatron, which showcased recently at UK-based counter-E3 conference EToo.

Speaking of UK conferences, John Brindle recently attended London-based game design conference Bit of Alright, and wants to show us inside.

As one of the year’s most-anticipated releases, Naughty Dog’s The Last of Us had some pretty steep expectations to meet. We won’t deluge you with all the reviews that have been put out; instead, here’s a few useful analyses.

Our own Cameron Kunzelman believes the theme doesn’t totally stack up: “Children of Men is about a man dying so that the world can live on. The Road is about a man trapped so far inside of himself that he can’t see the world for how it is.”

The idea that at the end of the day, games are obligated to serve the purpose of “fun” above all others has been the main wrench in the works of the gaming industry’s machinations for legitimacy. Why should games be mature, cope with social issues, reflect society, or demonstrate the genuine artistic vision of a grown-up creator? At the end of the day, they’re just for fun, say gamers when they’ve run out of defenses against the mainstream industry’s embarrassing, stagnant homogeneity.

Alarmingly, professional game creators often contribute to that echo chamber too.

Hello again, Mayor Reader! How are you adjusting to life here in Critical-Distance Land? Are you still living in that tent?

If you need some more things to do, you should visit the Blogs of the Round Table! Alan Williamson is always looking for more writers.

I’d also recommend sending in your links via Twitter or our email submissions form! Please only use the email submissions form for legitimate queries, though. We don’t actually know whether your game is art. It probably is, but we can’t judge them all on a case-by-case basis, that’s what we have The Game Police for…

Oh! That’s all I had! I think? Let me double-check my clipboard… Yup! No more links here! See you next week!